Bare body or nude — Jatin Das argues about the difference with Kishore Singh
It is difficult to say anything about Jatin Das without it seeming like a contradiction, though few would argue with the contention that he has more edges than most people, is fiercely independent, and though he can and does get into heated discussions, he would rather not talk about his paintings at all. “There’s too much intellectualising of art,” he says, “too much analysing. When you look at a painting, it says everything. Why discuss it? When you listen to Kumar Gandharva sing, you don’t bother about what raga it is, what the tenor is, you just enjoy it.”
Yet, Das is in his element. He may be exhibiting in Delhi after nine years, but he’s had shows in Mumbai and Kolkata in 2007, in Dubai in 2006, even in Greece in 2005. But you almost never see his paintings in group shows, and despite his being extraordinarily prolific, these days it’s altogether easier to run into Das himself than his works. And though he seeks to separate the persona of the artist from his paintings, it’s difficult to do given his obvious eccentricities. His signature accessory, almost as familiar as his robust signature, is the jhola which seems never to leave his shoulder.
He can come to the dressiest events in a crushed kurta. At parties where there’s music, he dances with a fierceness that is compelling — part taandav, part sufi — and then, just as abruptly, will pick up his jhola and leave. And now, for no reason at all, and somewhat disconcertingly since we’re indoors, Das has jammed a hat over his head, so it’s difficult to make eye-contact while we speak.
Nor is it easy to engage him in conversation. He can appear terse, or long-winded, walking across the floor of the gallery where 66 of his paintings hang, to greet a visitor, wave another off, ask for coffee, pick up a catalogue, or simply for no reason at all. His restlessness could be the reason for the long gaps between his exhibitions — he claims to dislike “mounting, framing, photographing, cataloguing, packing, unpacking…it just doesn’t seem worth it”, yet in the very next breath he’ll say, “You need five-six days, five-six visits, to absorb these,” commanding you into obedience.
Ever since the start of his career, Jatin Das has made the nude his own, and now into his fifth decade as an artist, while his strokes may have changed, his fascination with the human form has not. And yet, he’ll argue that he does not paint nudes. “They would be nude if they got out of the clothes they wore,” he explains, “but my figures are without clothes so they are not nude but bare bodies,” which distinction, if any, might be lost on most art lovers. What matters is that the torso is the main focus of his painting — in oil, or conte, or watercolour — with nothing that is derivative. “There is no architecture, no time or place in which they exist, so you see them in your context” and, of course, in the context of what they depict — “joy, sorrow, happiness, suffering and anguish”.
While he may quell “romantic notions about creativity, or inspiration, or mood, or listening to poetry”, associating the task of painting to “work, just like anyone else”, those who have been observing his work over the decades cannot help remarking that the virility of his line work is blurring, that though the figure remains central, there is a greater sense of abstraction. When you mention this to Das, he is expectedly dismissive — as he is when you point out the emergence of brighter colours in some of his works — admitting only that yes, “the drawings are more internalised”. Nor can you help notice that there might be works that tease the viewer, almost as if Das has deliberately set out to play with him. Tell him this and he retorts that he does not paint consciously. Yet a minute later he will admonish you for watching an oil from too close, a watercolour from too far — “you have to see the details”, he holds your hand to inch you closer to a wash drawing, “observe the tribhanga pose”. Painting without a conscious thought? Perish the idea — Jatin Das is as deliberate a painter as almost anyone I know.